


Meeting Up // Catching Up

by Hexx



Category: Young Wizards
Genre: Everyone else gets a meantion, Gen, Kinda star stuff?, Purgatory equivalent?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-04-05 13:52:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4182315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hexx/pseuds/Hexx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Roshaun wakes up after the moon, not where he thought he would be but not alone.</p><p>--</p><p>In which Fred goes somewhere he has been before, to see someone about some old friends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meeting Up // Catching Up

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lightningrani](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lightningrani/gifts).



> For lightningrani:
> 
> I kind of ended up focusing more on the 'update' part of your prompt then I thought I would but I hope that's alright! I hope you enjoy reading the story as much as I enjoyed writing it for you~

The first exhale feels like smoke leaving his body. A cool, sighing rush as he pushes outwards into the void he finds himself in. Roshaun opens his eyes slowly before squeezing them shut against the unexpected bright light around him. Unlike the different suns he had grown accustomed to looking upon, this light did not pry at the corners of his shut eyes, haloing the dark with a reminder that time was passing.

 _When have I ever been one to ignore the light of a sun?_ He wondered for a moment before forcing himself to open his eyes fully against the light with all the royal grace he could muster. But this time the light did not blind him, though it hadn’t seemed to dim any. It cradled him as he floated in white wisps of air set against more white and he didn’t understand how he could see the difference in their shades.

Roshaun exhaled again, watching as white vapor did exit his mouth and mingle with the rest of the environment. He propelled himself up until he felt like he was sitting in the void, though it was hard to tell when one is floating, and looked around. More white on white on white greeted him every way he looked and while it was somehow soothing, it was nothing he had expected Timeheart to look like.

 _Timeheart._ He thought, mouth going dry as he glanced down at his hands. Am I dead? He remembered the moon, what he did. Well, what he tried to do. He guessed by his current surroundings and the lack of weight pressing against his throat that things had not gone entirely to plan. With a pain in his chest he wondered if the battle had been won or lost. He couldn’t remember anything after the light had surrounded him but felt a dull ringing in his ears of his name being shrieked across the landscape in fear.

But he doubted that had happened. He doubted very much that even in a moment of fear, of terror, that she would scream so wretchedly at all. Particularly for him. Shrugging his shoulders back, he tried not to think about it and focus on the moment at hand in the void. With a slow blink, Roshaun felt himself bob slightly up and down and wondered for a moment why his hair was not free floating as he appeared to be.

[It doesn’t seem to work that way I’m afraid] A voice like tingling bells or vibrating glass or something ethereal and indescribable filled not only Roshaun’s ears but his mind as well. He turned his head to see a bright, condensed ball of white light zipping towards him, disrupting the white vapors that floated past. The light came to rest just in front of him, flashing slightly as the voice spoke again. [Though I can’t tell you why it doesn’t, seeing as I always float myself.]

Something in the way the light spoke, and moved, and breathed gave off a familiar tingle in Roshaun’s being. The light ebbed in a tiny figure eight as if excited to see him. It radiated its own tiny heat that just barely touched Roshaun before vanishing as if capped off. With a slight bit of awe in his voice, Roshaun said “You’re part star.”

[In a sense.] The light replied, sounding delighted. It twinkled while doing a slightly larger figure eight. [I used to be a star. A pretty nice one if I say so myself, but I am now a-]

“A white hole.” Roshaun finished. Understanding why the sun was so small and compact before him. Though not why it was free moving and more sentient then other stars he had met.

[Indeed!] Bright flashes of light caused Roshaun to squint slightly at the white hole’s excitement. [It is an interesting change I might add, one that I am still getting used to despite my passing on.] The light tittered a bit as if catching itself in its own train of thought. [Oh, forgive my manners! I didn’t introduce myself! I was just so excited at getting to meet a Guarantor, and one who I shared friends with too! That I forgot to introduce myself properly!] The white hole held itself still and swelled momentarily, taking in a breath that Roshaun wasn’t sure it required or not. [My name is Khairelikoblepharehglukumeilichephriedosd'enagouni and it is a pleasure to meet you, Roshaun ke Nelaid am Seriv am Teliuyve am Meseph am Veliz am Teriaunist am det Nuiiliat am det Wellahit.] The white light made a little bowing motion and Roshaun shot his hand out to cup it in his hand, drawing it close to his face.

“How did you know who I was?”

[I knew before I came here, after all I came specifically to see you!] Khairelikoblepharehglukumeilichephriedosd'enagouni said cheerfully.

“But why?” Roshaun looked around them again at the bright void. “And where is here?”

[I was in the area when news came about what had happened on Earth’s moon reached those of us in Timeheart with loved ones involved.] The light explained. [And when I saw what happened to you, I realized you must be here in The Passing, so I came to see.] A bright flash of warm pinkish light fluttered across Roshaun’s palm [And I was right!]

“Timeheart…the moon, you-“ He swallowed thickly. “You were able to know about that?”

[Well, in a sense. Not all of Timeheart is aware, but one of our mutual friends who has traveled between Earth and Timeheart before came and she asked her mother Betty about you and then Betty told me and then I said-]

“Khairelikoblepharehglukumeilichephriedosd'enagouni” Roshaun said, interrupting, though the name left him slightly out of breath from the closeness of its syllables.

[Fred.] The white hole offered, a touch of fondness in its tone.

“Fred.” Roshaun said slowly, testing the name momentarily before pressing on. “What mutual friend, who told you about me?”

[Betty told me about you.]

 _Betty_. That name ringed around his head as he tried to place the familiarity of it. An image flashed in his mind of the Callahan house, of the framed pictures clustered together on open surfaces in the living room and hung on the walls of the hallway. Sitting isolated like a shrine amongst the mess of things in Dairine’s room. _Her mother._

“Who told Betty, was it Dairine?” Roshaun asked, restraining himself from tightening his hold on Fred.

[Dairine? Oh goodness is she a wizard now?] The brightness of Fred dimmed a little as he floated down to nestle in Roshaun’s palm. [I’m afraid I have missed a lot since going to Timeheart.]

Roshaun drew his free hand up to stroke Fred in comfort. The light dimmed to a rosy hue before brightening again.

[You have to tell me everything I have missed since I went away. I have missed the earth and Nita and Kit so dreadfully.] Fred resumed his small figure eights midair. [I would have liked to meet Dairine properly though, but I’m afraid Nita and Kit were keeping their wizardry a secret when I met them.]

“Dairine is a very powerful wizard, though she’s a bit on the bossy side…and the families do not hide their wizardry from one another anymore.” Roshaun tilted his hand so that Fred slid out of it and hovered just above his knee. “I have been staying in the Callahan residence for an excursion. Dairine and I, well along with every young wizard on Earth it seems, were fighting the Pullu-“

Fred twinkled abruptly, before saying [Oh, I know all about that. Nita filled her mother in quite nicely. I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind telling me about more…domestic things I might have missed. While you’re still here, that is.] Fred flared warmly with excitement. [You were all very brave, your majesty, but may we talk of smaller things?]

Roshaun blinked at the white hole before nodding and settling back into the white vapor around them. As he started to explain how he came to be on earth at all he found himself pausing and looking around again. “Fred, you called this The Passing before, what did you mean?”

[That is its name.] Fred explained, tinkling. [It is a place where you go when you have not reached the place the Powers mean for you to be.]

“Then I haven’t- I’m not-“ Roshaun paused, a lump in his throat as the words refused to rise up.

[I don’t know, honestly.] Fred said with a slight dimming. [When I came to The Passing, it was because Nita and Kit used a timeslide. I was here until the natural events caught up with themselves back on Earth…and then I died.] Fred did a tiny figure eight and brightened. [But that doesn’t mean you’re dying! Oh by no means. From what Nita said of your actions on the moon, I doubt the Powers have finished with you. You must be going somewhere very special.]

Roshaun tried to wrestle down the anxious fear inside of him, schooling his face to show no sign of the distress as he had been taught. The Passing didn’t feel like it was taking him anywhere. Besides the gentle up and down bob he felt every once in a while he didn’t feel like he was moving at all. “So, how do I know when I’ll get there?”

[You will know it as you have always known about your wizardry, I’d imagine.] Fred theorized. [The Powers will let you know somehow.]

“And if someone were to come looking for me, could they-“ Roshaun was cut off by Fred abruptly shaking from side to side. It took him a moment of confusion before he realized the tiny celestial body was shaking itself like one on Earth would shake their head no.

[The Passing doesn’t work like that. You can only find it again after being here once before, and you can only be here if the Powers that Be place you here.]

Despair chilled Roshaun through, despite the warmth Fred was producing in an earnest effort to be comforting. He felt trapped and uneasy, and for a moment he wondered why the Powers that Be would have made such a place as The Passing to start with, where a Wizard was trapped against their will almost. But a soothing force touched him inside, stroked at his tense psyche like his mother would stroke at his hair and he felt a Power brush through him. He composed himself. The Powers could not explain themselves, but everything they did had a purpose and he would know it soon enough.

Roshaun extended his hand to Fred, and the white hole filled his palm while making a soft buzzing sound like a purr. Drawing the light up to his face, Roshaun smiled as best he could. “Nita and Kit were not on planet when I first arrived, but I did get to meet them after they returned from errantry on the planet they were staying on.” He began, watching the way Fred flared up with joy at the very names of the other wizards. “I arrived on Earth in the company of two other wizards, Filifermanhathhumneits'elhhessaifnith and Sker'ret.”

Time in the Passing may have been moving or it may have been at a standstill. Roshaun couldn’t be sure and he wasn’t positive if he really wanted to be either. Fred was a charming companion who was excited and horrified in equal parts as Roshaun recounted as many details as he knew about Nita and Kit’s exploits since he had passed on.

[The Motherboard planet sounds beautiful] Fred gleamed wistfully, twirling slightly in contemplation. [Nita and Kit carried the One’s Champion all the way there without knowing it! What good, brave souls.] Roshaun looked at the white hole with a small smile. The adoration and love that rolled off Fred for Nita and Kit, the concern for the wellbeing of the two wizards was palpable in the heat and light of its glow.

“I’m sorry if some of my details are lacking, these are just the stories I know from Dairine and a little from Carmela.”

[You tell them wonderfully, I am very thankful to know they have been doing such powerful good.] Fred flared a soft tangerine color and dispelled a little bit of the white vapor around them with his excited bobbing. The wisps slid over Roshaun’s cheeks and felt cool but not cold. [Dairine and Carmela, it is a shame I never got to meet them.]

Roshaun nodded. “I am glad my mother convinced me to take the trip. The whole lot of them have been gracious, though unorthodox by my planets standards.” He ran a hand through his long hair, drawing a handful of it over his shoulder and letting it fall down his chest. “The food is interesting, a whole other story to be honest.” He grinned at Fred. ”Did you ever try any?”

[No,] Fred said, sounding a tad sheepish. [I spent most of my time on earth spitting things up instead of ingesting them. With of course the exception of Nita’s space pen.] He did a wistful little twirl. [I would have liked to try the food. Tell me about the food, please.]

Roshaun grinned. “Well, they have these things called lollipops, which is a type of candy.”

[Candy?]

“Candy.”

Later, either a moment or an hour Roshaun couldn’t be sure, he found himself running out of things to tell the white hole. With a dull ache he realized that his time on Earth was longer then Fred’s but still very short. Shorter then it felt like. With a twinge of discomfort Roshaun realized it felt like he had been on Earth with the Callahan family for years rather than weeks.

He thought dimly of the teasing and the sarcasm Nita and Dairine had thrown back and forth with tender ease, the way their Father had turned to each new resident of his home like they were children of his own getting despite the radical differences. The way Kit and Carmela fit perfectly into the household, and Nita into theirs. How big and yet how small the family itself was. Roshaun’s mind once more flickered to the pictures of their mother on the tables and the way all three Callahan’s voices would soften if they were reminded of her in any way. With a lump in his throat, Roshaun cupped Fred to him.

“Fred, would you tell me somethings now?”

[Of course.] Fred said, tone curious.

“Would you tell me about Betty Callahan?”

Fred made a ‘hmm’-ing sound of consideration and spoke with warm care. [Of course.]


End file.
